Just Wednesday

It’s amazing. I can’t go anywhere, I can’t do anything, and for some reason, I’m exhausted.

Yep, I’m still hobbling around, but I am getting better. Every day the pain is a little less intense and I seem to be able to hobble just a tiny bit faster, so, progress.

In the meantime, I’ve almost run out of books to read, since I couldn’t get any new stuff this week. Darc went and had to drop off our stuff that was due this week by himself, and he did grab a movie I had on hold that came in for me, called Expelled. Awesome movie, I highly recommend it if you get the chance to see it. But he didn’t have a chance to grab any new stuff.

Other than that, I’m just meandering back and forth from the bed to the couch.

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6 thoughts on “Just Wednesday”

Expelled was an interesting doc. I don’t know very much about the whole evolution/creation/intelligent design debate. My stance has always been “Fine! We evolved from monkeys. Now how do I pay my rent?” (Many thanks to Jon Lovitz.)
I also think that these nouveau documentaries are way too one-sided. For good docs, I really gotta side with Ken Burns (who by the way has a new doc series about baseball airing on PBS, saw a bit last night, it was pretty coo-ool).
Expelled did raise one good point to me when I watched it. If we evolved, how did the first life-form come to be? I can easily accept evolution because it just makes so much sense to me. But how did that first amoeba come into existence?
The doc also enforces a theory I’ve had for quite a while. The powers-that-be in any field are more interested in being in power than being right. Which is really what that doc is all about. Scientists being expelled from institutions because they have theories that don’t jive with the theories of the people in charge. The heads of science departments at universities and think-tanks and such should be more interested in studying science than enforcing one theory over another. An institution of higher learning should never have any accepted truths and should be always trying to learn more. Instead of discredited a different point of view, it should be asking “Okay, I accept that you have a different point of view, now prove it?” I kinda thought that was the whole purpose of scientific research. I mean, look at Columbus. He said the Earth was round. Few people believed him. So he tried to prove it. The end result: Spain (briefly) got rich on gold.

As for Ben Stein’s entertainment value in this doc, he could have been better. Seriously, would it have killed him to put in an intermission of just him saying “Bueller. Bueller.”

The heads of science departments at universities and think-tanks and such should be more interested in studying science than enforcing one theory over another.

That’s it, in a nutshell. You have to wonder why they’re so opposed to anyone having any other POV. What’s the purpose? Science is supposed to question, but now-a-days, questions are no longer allowed. That’s a problem and it needs to be addressed.

And I think the Bueller line might have defeated the purpose of the documentary. Just sayin’.

I’ve always thought the problem was that no one wants to admit being wrong. People in power always believe they’re right. That’s why they’re in power. I mean, I don’t think anyone in power actually thinks they’d rather be wrong than give up power. They feel that being in power validates what they think. They are in power; therefore, they are right. So, how can they admit to being wrong?

Just a thought. I, of course, could be wrong.

Power certainly has something to do with it, but I often suspect it goes deeper. When the money is flowing in for “research grants” and things of that nature, the ones who are getting it probably become less interested in finding the truth than they are in keeping the cash coming. Anything that threatens that cash cow has to be “taken down” so to speak. Money is an incredible motivator.

Oh, I agree with that. I suppose it has a lot to do with the situation and the person. Being wrong is very painful and difficult. Nobody likes to admit to being wrong, and if you think you have a lot to lose (like your job, no small thing that), you will can convince yourself you’re right in spite of all evidence to the contrary. I recently read a great article on human beings deep need to be right–which the author didn’t mean the person actually was right, but we need to believe that we are.

Great topic. I’d natter on too much about it if I could.
But don’t you think there are some things that actually are right and some things that actually are wrong? So, would you rather cling to a wrong thing just out of some need to believe you’re right, or would you rather actually find what the right things are and then believe in them?

No, that’s not what I meant. It is hard to sort this out in a comment. Of course, some things are absolutely wrong. And some things are right. And I want what I believe to be actually right. But plenty of people who are wrong, don’t know they’re wrong. They aren’t always wrong on purpose. They’ve looked at the world, the evidence, and they’ve come to a particular conclusion that they are certain is the right one. Now, if you “know’ you are right, do you continue to look for evidence that you are wrong? Probably not. Who does that?

No, I think if you know you’re right, you continue to look for evidence that supports you.

There’s something in your statement that grabs me though. “They’ve looked at the world, the evidence, and they’ve come to a particular conclusion that they are certain is the right one.” If they’ve looked at evidence, that gives the impression of being open to truth, and open to changing their minds if the evidence points that way. That isn’t the same kind of person who refuses to acknowledge evidence that shows them to be in error. Know what I mean?

And if you’ve invested your emotion and your life and your money and whatever else into what you are dead certain is right, how are you going to feel if it turns out to be wrong? Hmmm. I guess what I’m getting at is denial. Think of a person who refuses to see evidence of a spouse cheating. It is so painful to be proven wrong about the person you love, that you cling to what you want to believe.

Sure you’re going to feel bad. Here is the choice of poisons – continue to foolishly believe in a lie, or courageously face the truth? No, no one ever said it was easy, but isn’t it better to find what is true and believe in that, than to have a belief and hope that it’s true? It’s a cart/horse thing I think.

I’m not saying you as in you, Darcs, just you in general. People. I just think that for most of us, just seeing evidence contrary to our beliefs doesn’t make us say, “oh, well, I’ve been wrong all this time and that’s okay. Now I’ll believe this other thing.”

I should have stressed that I was using “you” in the general sense, not you specifically, as well. I’m sorry I didn’t do that and sorry if you took it that way.
That’s my question though: why would someone wish to continue being wrong, when they can choose to believe now in what is true? “I’d rather live in denial than acknowledge the truth.” I don’t get people like that.

I remember a student I had who believed completely that Jews were not killed in WWII, America never landed on the moon, and that 9/11 was a hoax with no airplanes involved at all. And no amount of anything would convince him otherwise. Everything you showed him was part of the conspiracy and evidence of other people’s ignorance and gullibility.

It’s this kind of person that causes me to wonder what happened to him to make him like this. There is so much evidence for these things, and witnesses too. Does he hate Jews that much? Does he hate America that much? Why?

Certainly there comes a time when you have to stop beating your head against a brick wall, and I’ve had to do that with some people too, but I never cease to be amazed at people’s willingness to believe in a lie.

All right. I’ve got to get off this computer. But maybe this better expresses what I was thinking!